Per Mertesacker is entrusted with the job of collecting fines from Arsenal players in breach of club discipline but the German may find himself going cap in hand to manager Arsene Wenger for his place in the team.

Andre Villas-Boas wants window cut after Gareth Bale ‘soap opera’

Andre Villas-Boas today likened the Gareth Bale saga to a “soap opera” as he joined a number of top coaches in calling for the transfer window to shut before the season started,

Bale was pursued by Real Madrid all summer but the Spanish club only completed his £86million world record move from Tottenham the day before the window closed.

Speaking after attending UEFA’s elite club coaches forum in Nyon, Villas‑Boas admitted Spurs found it hard dealing with the issue which dragged into the third week of the Premier League season.

The Spurs manager said: “In the end, as you saw our chairman say, the pressure we were under from the player has been intense, the influence of Madrid on the mental state of the player has been very great, you reach a point where if you don’t accept [the offer] can you go forward with the player in that mental state.

“Gareth’s last game for Tottenham was five weeks ago. Since then a lot of things happened and we had a soap opera which was hard to handle.

“The player is now happy and we should be happy to have the biggest transfer fee in history. The fans will be the least happy.

“When a bigger club come in it is hard to persuade a player to stay, even at a club that wants to get better — we want to win trophies, the path would have been shorter with him and it might be longer now but we have players who want to achieve things.”

At today’s meeting at UEFA HQ, Villas-Boas was among the managers who called on the governing body to shut the window earlier.

“Most of the coaches are unhappy with the closure of the window, most of the coaches would like it to be open less time and close earlier. Now we will have to have further meetings between UEFA and the clubs.”

Villas-Boas said the problem was that while coaches wanted an earlier finish, some club owners did not want the window to shut until Champions League qualification had been confirmed. This year’s play-offs were not completed until August 28.

The Spurs boss broke the club’s transfer record three times this summer, his biggest deal being the £30m paid to Roma for Erik Lamela.

“We’re very excited to have him, he’s a wonderfully gifted footballer, very creative,” he said. “We are very sure he will repay us.”